


A Little Fall of Rain

by Eleke



Category: Supernatural RPF
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2011-12-13
Updated: 2011-12-13
Packaged: 2017-10-27 06:41:07
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 12,369
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/292745
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Eleke/pseuds/Eleke
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Love is blind. That's what everybody keeps telling him. But Jared doesn't buy it. His eyes are crystal clear - and he hates himself more and more every time he forces them closed. (Written for the 2011 Reversebang. See inside for info on author. Posted with author's permission.)</p>
            </blockquote>





	A Little Fall of Rain

**Author's Note:**

> Written by the talented Anna-lei. Check it out at her DW at http://anna-lei.dreamwidth.org/15679.html?#cutid1

0.

The hallway probably isn’t as dark as it seems. The bare walls are patchy with damp and mould – peeling plaster and old paper clinging precariously to the sides afraid to touch the dirty, threadbare carpet that looks like it has more than a hideous paisley print living on it. He walks over it in short, steady steps, picking his way between used condoms and cracked needles; hands and feet that have spilt out into the hallway to create an obscene obstacle course. His eyes are still adjusting to the dim light and foggy haze that seems to clog the air, smoke and dust mingling together to sting his eyes and blur his already hazy vision. Every step, another scent assaults him – sickly, sweet, putrid smells, like a kid threw up two hundred pounds of candy and then died in it.

Doors litter the sides between slumped bodies and soiled bowls, like some sort of fucked up game show, and he stops at every one – presses the side of his face against the wood and holds his breath to listen – tries the handle to see if it gives. See what prize lies behind.

He hears footfalls behind him, above the muted grunts and groans and the faint din of crying that buzzes in the air like white noise; a steady backdrop. He doesn’t need to look back to see who the feet belong to; he knows who it is. He knows that for all the bravado, for all his harsh words and cruel truths, his friend wouldn’t have lasted two minutes scowling against the truck outside before following him in.

“You’re making a mistake.” He’d been told, only minutes before, by the same scowling friend, tugging hard at his arm, imploring him to see sense, to see reason. But neither had every applied to him, really, to this fucked up situation that they’ve found themselves in again.

You’re making a mistake.

But he’s always been good about sharing those.

He knows that door number six is the winner without even pressing his face against it; knows with the kind of instinct that let him know this was the right neighbourhood, the right building, the right floor, even when everything else was so wrong.

Wrong, wrong, wrong.

He only lets himself hesitate for a split second, one hand flat against the cold wood, the other wrapped around the handle, before pushing it ajar – waits until he hears the footfalls stall behind him before he slips inside. He blinks against the darker shade of the new room, lets the new smells and the new sounds settle against his senses before his eyes trip over the various angles spread out around him. Even in the dark, he can find the pile of familiar ones in the far corner, slouched and distorted against the bathtub.

Only one person in this room. Only one prize. But it’s the one he’s been looking for.

The angles don’t twitch as he eases himself down beside him, onto the cold, dirty linoleum that smells like disease and sits still, lets himself breathe in, regroup – remember how to do this.

The rags twitch once when he pokes at them, twice when he nudges them hard with his knee. One eye blinks open, squints against the outside world, and it’s like someone’s poked a pinhole in a blackout blind. Emerald green shines outwards, doped and bright and ridiculously glassy, and pins him.

“Jay?”

Jared clears his throat, pretends he can only smell Mentos and cherry cola on the breathy exhale; pretends he hasn’t ever promised he’d never force himself to pretend like this again.

“Yeah, Jen. It’s me.”

Jensen mumbles something nonsensical on a breathy sigh and closes his eyes again.

Jared makes no move to touch him, no attempt to shift off the floor; just folds his hands uselessly in his lap, lets his head tip back to rest against the rim of the grimy tub, stares at a patch of damp on the ceiling tile.

“I’ve come to take you home,” he mumbles at the tile, at no one in particular. Just to hear it out loud. Just so he can pretend like it will help at all. Just to pretend that sitting on this tile, and smelling these smells and seeing those eyes, don’t make him feel seventeen again.

“I’m gonna take you home.”

 

1.

There’s a moment, right after a rainstorm, when the whole world seems to pause, halfway between wet and dry, and the entirety of Texas stops on an exhale. Jared thinks it only ever happens in Texas.

Jared loves those moments.

When he was a little boy, he used to press his face against the glass of the window and watch the thunderstorms roll over during summer time.

“Nothing to be scared of,” his father used to tell Megan, when she’d spend the whole night in the safety of his arms, shuddering and hiccuping at every rumble. “It’s just God bowling.”

Afterwards, once the rain had evaporated and the clouds rolled on by, Jared would go outside and stand at the bottom of their yard and watch the sun strain to paint the sky a dusty shade of pink while his mother smiled fondly at him through the kitchen window. The air would be crisp and clear and his nostrils would burn with the smell of damp grass and the birds would be loud and restless in the wind.

Jared would breathe in deep. And he would feel, in that moment, perfectly, absolutely okay.

And then he would turn around and go back inside.

 

2.

 

The air around them is cold, biting when the wind blows to shuffle the multitude of fallen leaves around their feet. To his left, his mother shifts a little closer to his side and adjusts her scarf. Megan’s clinging precariously to his right elbow. Their mother had looked at her dubiously when she’d appeared in the kitchen this morning, just as she was brushing lint off of Jared’s only black wool coat that was probably older than their mortgage.

“We should probably make up numbers,” the sixteen-year-old had sniffed simply, leading them all bullheadedly out to the car, ignoring her family’s raised eyebrows and doubtful glances.

She hadn’t been wrong. There are only a handful of people gathered around the open grave as the priest up front drones on about light and tunnels and redemption. Jared hears his mother tut under her breath at that and shifts his eyes to look up out over the cluster of black clad bodies, down-turned faces.

Josh is front and centre, Laurie tucked tight against his side, her blond hair whipping a halo around their faces. He looks up and catches Jared’s eyes on him and gives him a tiny smile. Gratitude, probably, blanketed in sheer relief. Jared and his family are probably some of the only familiar faces here amidst the sea of drinking buddies and drifters and old factory workers.

Twelve in total, counting the priest. Twelve people to mourn the loss of a life none of them really knew, that more than half of them could never, ever approve of.

Even though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I do not fear evil.

Josh steps forward and throws a handful of dirt towards the hole. It lands with a scattered echo on the dull wood and he steps back, Laurie’s gloved hand a tight, steady grip on his arm.

Ashes to ashes, dust to dust.

Jared’s eyes automatically swing to the back of the crowd. He’s stood off to the side, slouched near the back in black leather and denim. No signs of chill, or tears, or dirt. He’s here out of respect for his brother, no one else. His passive features scream it; his posture demands they all know it. And he clearly doesn’t much care what they think.

This is the first time Jared has seen him. He slunk in after the precession – after Josh and Laurie and the one lonely aunt who had come out of the woodwork have taken their seats, front row, in the church. He’d made sure the door slammed shut, loud and obnoxious, behind him to interrupt the priest’s introduction and then dropped into the pew nearest the door, arms crossed, eyes on the window to his right. Josh had shared an uneasy look with Jared over his shoulder as everyone settled back into their seats after the intrusion and Jared had raised a questioning eyebrow and shrugged. Why people were so quick to turn an eye to him, Jared had no fucking idea. He’s been back in town for all of twelve hours and they’re watching him like he has all the answers stashed back in his carry on.

For you are dust, and to dust you shall return.

The priest wraps up and the tiny huddle of nomads scatter like a gunshot, probably eager to get back to propping up a bar somewhere under the veil of toasting their newly departed friend. His mother squeezes his arm and tilts her head back towards the car as she bundles Megan to her side and slinks back over the grass. Jared stays where he is. Eyes trained on the dark, half-empty hole left behind. It should be hard to believe that a lifetime of troubles can fit into a hole so small. It should be easy to believe that the last shovel of dirt could wipe it all away, but it won’t. Jared’s not so naive as to think so anymore.

“Do you wanna get out of here?”

Jared startles at the voice behind him – his eyes tear away from the grave site and land on the person standing two feet behind him, eyes trained solely and wholly on Jared’s face, unmoving. It’s the first thing they’ve said to each other in almost a year and it’s strangely fitting. It’s almost like nothing’s changed, with Jared standing around contemplating problems that should have no meaning to him and Jensen trying to scramble away from it all with life and limb.

“Yes.”

Nothing’s changed at all, really. Jared’s answer will always be the same.

 

3.

 

The apartment is small, filthy in a kind of push-you-over-the-edge way.

It took twenty minutes to drive from the windy gravesite the un down apartment block on 7th street. The ride was spent in silence – Jared’s face pressed up against the freezing glass of the passenger window and Jensen fumbling his way through gears as the radio buzed white noise as a back drop. Jared had watched him and Josh fix the same truck up sophmore year from ntothing more than a burnt out chassis and a couple of qaility leather seats – but try as they like they could never quite master the radio. Nothings perfect, Jared supposed.

He can still remember Jensen’s giddy smile the morning he found him on his doorstep – keys in hand, shifitng eagerly from foot to foot as he asked if Jared wanted to go for a ride. It wasn’t a truck to Jensen, back then. It was freedom. It was his way out of his house, out of their town. They could have gone anywhere with those keys if they’d wanted. With the windows rolled down and the cool air rushing in and whipping their hair. With Jensen laughing at Jared’s tight fngered grip on the dasboard and the whole highway laid out bare infront of them.

Jensen’s not laughing though – and it’s pretty cold to be winding down the windows.

“You uh…” Jensen’s voice is scratchy, worn with days of disuse; he fumbles with the keys and pushes the flimsy door open and drags his feet into the kitchenette. There are black smudges under his eyes, and the whites of his eyes are pinkish and his lips are dry and bitten. Jared hasn’t stopped staring at him since he stepped foot in the church this morning even though he hasn’t quite met Jared’s eyes yet. “You want something to drink?” Jensen asks it almost apologetically as he throws the keys with a clatter onto the counter and turns to face Jared, and if Jared hadn’t been watching as closely as he was, he would have missed the slight wince as Jensen looks over the rest of the apartment.

“Sure,” Jared says, but it’s a lie. He’s not thirsty. He’s a lot of things in that moment, but thirsty is absolutely not one of them. “What do you have?”

“Water,” Jensen mumbles, pulling two chipped glasses from the draining board beside the sink and flicking on the facet. Jared’s not surprised. He’s actually shocked that there’s running water at all, considering the layout of the rest of the abode. “Water’s fine,” Jared says, lowering his gaze to his feet before Jensen can tell that he’s lying horrifically. Nothing is fine; nothing about this is fine at all.

“You want the tour?” He smirks, and he’s clearly going for humour in the degrading black way that he always has, but Jared doesn’t dare open his mouth to let out a chuckle in case all of his insides tip out along with it.

Jensen sets the glass down on the counter in front of Jared and downs his own in one gulp. Jared flicks his gaze behind his shoulder and where the rest of the room is spread out. It’s a studio, smaller than Jared’s backyard at home. One double mattress sits against the back wall, rumpled sheets on top of the box spring and a portable TV on top of an upturned milk crate. The walls are grey, and the lonely kitchen stool has shapes and scribbles carved into the seat, proudly displaying names and slurs that Jared can’t quite make out. None of them look like Jensen’s handwriting, so Jared surmises that it came with the lease.

“I think I can get the full 4-D experience from right here, thanks.”

Jensen raises his eyebrow and nods. “You probably can.” He’s leaning back against the sink now, ankles crossed, hands braced either on the ledge behind him, fingers of one hand still clutching the empty glass. He looks smaller than the last time, more cheekbone, more rib. His t-shirt hangs off him more than it seemingly should, the band name across the front wrinkling and folding in on itself in the excess fabric, and his jeans hang off his ass despite the belt. Despite its dismal interior design, it’s pretty warm in the apartment – it’s a pretty warm night out in general – and Jared knows that his flannel overshirt isn’t draped over The Ramones to add any thermal insulation.

“What happened with Josh?”

Jensen’s eyes don’t flicker at the name. Don’t dim, don’t wilt, and Jared knows. He knows why they don’t even blink. People leave. People hit their limits. People aren’t built to last forever. It runs through Jared’s head like a mantra, like a prayer, even as Jensen shrugs a shoulder and turns to set his glass in the basin of the sink. “He kicked me out,” he says, flat, and Jared nods to himself even though Jensen can’t see his understanding. “Laurie’s pregnant.” There’s nothing to it. Just a fact of life handed over from one person to another. “He’s gonna be a dad.” Jared nods, slowly, contemplates, briefly, drinking down the water after all, just to ensure that something productive comes out of this whole thing. Just to try and dislodge his words from inside his gullet.

“What are you doing back?”

Jared looks up to see pinkish emerald eyes pinning him from across the tiny divide. The flannel-clad arms come up to cross in front of him; hackles up, shields down, ready to hear it, whatever it may be. Hit me with your best shot, it says to Jared.

“Time off.” Jared shrugs; it’s a lie, but it’s pretty convincing, he thinks. Truth is, Danni and Josh and Chris had all taken turns in calling him up insistently over the last two weeks. He ignored the first one, subdued the second, and by the third, he was on Highway 6 heading south away from his better judgment. Jensen knows this – probably. Jensen knows more than he thinks, more than he ever lets on; he always has. That’s maybe the stupidest thing about all of this.

When lips collide and hands slip up and under and tug at belts, judgement has nothing to do with it at all.

The mattress is surprisingly comfortable and Jensen laughs, wide and toothy, when he tells Jared that he got it on sale from Sears.

Jared strips it all away, belt first, then jeans, and lets his fingers run over every flannel button while Jensen sucks purple bruises into the base of his throat and bucks up against his jean-clad thigh. “I missed you,” panted into his neck, on top of every bruise and bite mark, and Jared knows. Jared knows more than Jensen thinks he does – but it doesn’t count for much now. He doubts it ever counted for anything. The truth is, they could know everything. Every secret of the universe, every hidden truth. They could live for a hundred years, and they would never understand exactly what this is.

They roll, flannel and all, over dirty sheets and comfy box springs, and Jared slips his tongue inside, pretends he can’t taste the oak of smoke and the sweet hint of sugar or the faint trace of salty grime that the mint from the gum hadn’t managed to erase completely. Tries to focus on that hint of Jensen that seeps out of everything, that spills into his mouth and covers his hands and fills up his eyes and his ears and traces every inch of his skin – up under his shirt, down the V of his jeans. Finds that tiny trace and lets it ignite; lets it carry him though. It’s not all that difficult.

It’s what he lives for, after all.

 

4.

His mother is baking something with cherries and cinnamon.

There’s flour dusting the counter and in the auburn of her hair when Jared appears through the back door and Meg looks up from the magazine she’s flipping through at her elbow, mixing bowl and spoon lying prone and forgotten beside it.

“We were expecting you back last night,” his mother says, lifting a hand to brush at his cheek as he passes by and drops a kiss on her face. “I was almost worried.”

“I had some errands to run.”

Errands to run, stuff to do, library work – it’s all an echo of the same old thing and they all know it. Mothers know everything. And history rarely lies. Mother hums nonchalantly as she kneads something doughy into the marble counter and Jared sees Megan look up again from the rag.

“Genevieve dropped this in for you.”

His mother says, nodding towards an envelope at the corner of the table and Jared leans over to slide it closer. “Her momma says she’s doing real good over there at St. Helen’s.”

It’s an invite to a charity auction for the paediatric ward. Tuesday, 8 o’clock, black tie optional.

“Does that mean you don’t have to wear the suit or you don’t have to wear a tie?” Jared asks no one and his mother shrugs – throws the pile of dough into a bowl by her hand.

“So long as you’re pushing nickels into the buckets they’re shaking, I don’t suppose they care if you wear bloodied scrubs.”

They’re talking like he’s going, but they all know he’s not. Usually, his mother would call him on it, but growing up, he’d heard the mantra of “charity starts at home” too many times for any scolding his mother could do to hold any weight. He’d be much more useful at home anyway, and he wouldn’t have to tie a tie.

“I’mma go upstairs and lie down.”

“Errands wear you out, baby?” his mother asks, her eyes still on the dial of the oven, breezy as ever in that way all-knowing mothers seem to be deep in their bones. Megan’s eyes follow him all the way out of the room through her peripheral.

It’s good to be home, Jared thinks as he climbs the stairs two at a time. He gets so fucking sick of talking with words all the time.

 

5.

“…and they didn’t catch up with him until he was fifteen miles outside Fort Worth, running on petrol fumes. It took five squad cars to barricade him.”

Jared looks up from stabbing at his tater tots in time to share Chad’s patented eye roll.

“And it’s true, too, ‘cause Kristen from Home Ec told me and her uncle’s totally the sheriff up there.”

Chad leans in towards Jared in a show of blatant dramatics: “Yeah, and I heard he was in an airport down in Austin last year and he blew up a jumbo jet full of terrorists; just, like, totally exploded the thing with nothing but a line of gasoline and a Zippo.”

Jared leans in towards him and lowers his voice in mock commiseration. “That wasn’t him. That was John McClane.”

“Oh. Right.” A balled-up napkin flies between their faces and bounced off Chad’s chin. Across from them, Sophia and Genevieve are scowling.

“You know what? Laugh it up, boys.” Sophia says petulantly, delicate fingers picking at her tuna sandwich. “But wait until he’s got a hand saw against your throat during wood shop – then you’ll want to know his track record.”

Jared snorts around a bite of potatoes. “Soph, that’s ridiculous,” he says, smirking at her. “Why the hell would I be in wood shop?”

Chad shrugs a baffled shoulder beside him, and then picks up his sandwich to take a huge bite and talk around it. “Well I think you’re all insane, just for the record.” A piece of chewed up bread shoots out of his mouth on the c and lands on Jared’s sleeve. He gags and tries to shake it off onto his tray. “Especially Kristen Bell; the girl;s a fucking nut job.” He jabs a thumb towards Jared. “She sexually assaulted him once in a stairwell.”

Sophia and Gen stare at Jared, wide-eyed.

“It’s true.” Jared nods solemnly. “She did.”

Chad waves off their horrified glances. “It’s okay; he totally had the height advantage.”

Sophia narrows her eyes to glare at Chad. “And what the hell do you know, anyway? You already shared a shower with the guy or something?”

“Somethin’ like that.” Chad grins wolfishly around decimated bread and pastrami, and Sophia makes a gagging sound in her throat. “He got transferred to my gym class second period. I know he pretty much keeps himself to himself, and that he has an above-average jump shot.” He swipes a fry off of Genevieve’s discarded plate and points it towards Sophia’s face. “And I know that Kristen Bell is still a fucking nut job.”

Sophia rolls her eyes loftily. “She is not.”

Chad smirks. “Nut job.”

“Are we talking mental issues, or sexual favours?” Danneel appears from nowhere with a lurid grin on her face and slides her tray between the girls’.

“We’re talking New Guy,” Gen informs her, shifting her books over to make room for Danni to slide her denim-clad hips into place.

Danneel’s eyes light up. “Oh, I heard he’s fresh from juvie, and my god so cute!” She turns excited eyes around the table, her fruit cup forgotten on her lunch tray. “You seen him?”

Jared shakes his head, shoving another tater tot into his mouth and jabbing his fork at Genevieve. “Gen had Lit with him yesterday.”

Danneel turns interestedly to where Gen is trying and failing to study for her French exam. She shrugs a shoulder and leans her elbows on her notebook. “Chad’s right, he’s pretty quiet,” she says, her face scrunching up under the sudden scrutiny. “Real quiet and kind of a loner. Pretty weird.”

“Cute?” Danneel prompts as Genevieve returns her attention to past participles.

“Oh yeah,” she says without missing a beat, and Danni whoops in victory.

“Hah!” She does a victory fist pump and pops a piece of kiwi into her mouth. “I knew it.”

“Cute?” Chad tilts his head slightly, squinting at Gen perplexedly. “Really?”

Gen looks up from the book and raises a perfectly arched eyebrow. “Are you kidding me?”

“So Jared,” Sophia pipes up, changing the subject swiftly as she pops open her soda and takes a delicate sip, “you decided on joining the paper this year or what?” Jared opens his mouth to reply with all the reasons he really should join the paper verses all the benefits of having free time to sit around on his ass and play Halo when Chad jabs him in the ribs pointedly with his elbow and cranes his neck to peer up towards the entrance.

“Hey, hey – check it out.” They watch Chad jut his chin out, a smirk pulling at his mouth. “Jailbait, twelve o’ clock.”

Danni nearly dislocates her neck whipping it around and Jared looks up disinterestedly, follows Chad’s gaze to the entrance, skips over the jocks and dinner ladies and vending machines to an unfamiliar blonde kid shuffling through the throngs of benches, backpack slung low off one shoulder, his head so low Jared doesn’t really know how he’s watching where he’s going.

“Oh yeah, he looks like he ticks all the tear-away juvie boxes to me,” Chad drawls sarcastically as the kid deviates suddenly towards their table and Sophie aims a swift kick to Chad’s shin.

The table falls silent as he passes his eyes pointedly down towards their trays; they pick absently at their food in a united show of indifference. Jared dares a quick glance upwards through the cover of his bangs when the guy’s directly on top of him and just about has a coronary when a pair of green eyes pin him right back and then break away quickly, back down to the floor as he shuffles on by without pause. Chad is unhinged. The guy is as cute as they come.

Jared tilts his head down and to the side to watch him slide into an empty table a couple of rows behind them and unzip his backpack. Out of his peripheral, Chad shoots him a covert glance that signals the all clear.

“What’s his name?” Jared asks as the guy pulls out a battered tape player and a pair of headphones and proceeds to ignore everyone around him.

Chad shrugs his shoulder and rack his brains. “Uh…Ackles, I think. Something Ackles.” Jared hums, raising an eyebrow to study him for another second before turning back round towards Sophia. “I think I’m gonna take paper as an elective.”

It takes another three days for him to overhear that Something Ackles is actually Jensen, Ackles.

It takes another two weeks for Jensen Ackles to change Jared’s whole world.

 

6.

It should probably feel weird being back in his room after a whole year, but it’s strangely mundane. Like he never left. Like it’s just been sitting here waiting for him to come back and pick up where he left off.

Like maybe, he never should have left in the first place.

Jared frowns and throws his backpack into the corner more forcefully than is necessary so it bangs against the wall. Stupid know-it-all room.

“You know,” he spins to find Megan leaning against his door frame, a tiny smirk playing at her mouth, “we saved a ton on plaster board with you outta here this year.”

“Shuddup,” he mutters petulantly, moving over to tip his duffel of clothes onto the bed, “you totally missed me.”

She sighs heavily and folds her spindly arms. “Yeah, I guess I did. Sometimes. Maybe.” She wrinkles her nose at his smug glare, and then sequels when he aims a pair of his boxers at her head.

“So, you’re back, then?” He looks up from the laundry to find her eyes trained on his backpack and clothes spread out over the linen. “For good?”

Jared’s eyes narrow a little at the sudden shift, and he shrugs a shoulder. “For now.” His eyes narrow on instinct. He may have been a little out of the loop these last few months, but he’s well versed in little sister. Call it years of practice, call it brotherly intuition. “Why?”

She shrugs a shoulder and fires the underwear back to him in a sloppy arch that lands at the foot of his bed. “No reason. Just like to know these things, is all.”

Jared watches her for a moment more and then sighs, sinking down onto the bed. “Look, Meg – I’m really sorry I missed your birthday. I tried to get the time off, you know I did – but there were deadlines and I couldn’t…”

He watches her face morph from blank seriousness to a soft smile. “Jared stop, before you hurt yourself. Seriously.” She steps into his room and tilts her head with a playful smirk. “My birthday was fine. This isn’t about my birthday.”

Jared drops his hands and frowns, the rest of his heartfelt apology ready to go on the tip of his tongue. “Oh.” He says, deflated. “It’s not?”

“No.” His eyes track her dubiously as she drags her finger along the top if his dresser on her way across the floor. She turns and leans against the window and folds her arms across her waist, her eyes lingering on the pile of clothes and then lifting to meet his, kind of shiny and water-filled.

“Have you seen Jensen?” she asks, her voice shaky, her fingers gripping tighter at her sweater. “That’s where you were last night, right? With Jensen?”

Jared’s head tilts back slightly, the question catching him off guard, but he nods slowly, too blindsided by the broken look in his baby sister’s eyes to lie to her now. “Yeah. I was with Jensen.”

She nods, licks her lip, thoughtfully, and then turns as if she’s going to eave but stops suddenly mid-stride on an afterthought and turns back round, her voice barely a whisper. “Is he going to be okay?”

The question derails him a little, more so because every one of his instinctual brotherly instincts is screaming at him to answer on default. To tell her that he’ll always make it okay. To tell her she has nothing to worry about. But then, he’s never really sure how much of it she remembers. How much of it she actually understood back then.

He quirks a dubious eyebrow at her and asks hesitantly, “What makes you think he’s not okay?”

She pauses again, her mouth open to spill all of those secrets that Jared used to be able to pull out of her with one look when they were kids. Megan could never, ever keep a secret.

Not one that mattered.

“He’s been missing my volleyball games,” she says finally, uncertainly meeting his eyes again, and Jared feels a little bit like he’s been sucker punched. Because of course Jensen picked up the slack while Jared was gone. Of course he kept up their tradition of making sure there was a friendly face at every one of Jared’s baby sister’s games. Of course he never let her down, watched out for her when Jared couldn’t. Jared doesn’t know why he’s surprised.

It’ll never be that easy with Jensen.

“He’s not okay,” Megan says slowly, her voice watery and breathy with understanding as she watches Jared through narrowed eyes, “is he?” It’s not really a question, and Jared realises that maybe little Megan knows more than she thinks; knew more back then than he suspected.

He crosses the room and pulls her tiny body into the fold of his arms. “No, he’s not,” he admits, finally, and feels her hiccup into his shirt. “But he will be, Meggie.”

And in that moment, Jared means it. He means it with everything he is.

“I promise.”

Because Jared’s never broken a promise. Never one that mattered.

 

7.

“What’s that?”

Jensen spins round and follows Jared’s gaze to the box sitting on the corner of his dresser. His lips twitch.

“It’s a camera,” Jensen says simply, as Jared stares kind of dumbly down at the box in his hands. Black tape is wound round the shabby-looking oatmeal box – a tiny hole the size of a needle head pushes through one side. It doesn’t look much like a camera. But then, Jared is learning that not everything is as it first appears.

Like Jensen Ackles, for example. The blond-tipped newbie rebel boy who sits two rows in front of Jared in math class.

“A camera?” Jensen smirks at Jared’s dubiously raised eyebrow and throws the algebra books back onto the bed and moves over to the dresser.

“Yeah, a camera.” He plucks the box off the corner and twirls it in his hand. “It’s a pinhole camera. The light comes through here,” his finger points to a single hole in the front of the black tape, “and it projects an image onto the film inside,” He twirls in again and pushes it back into Jared’s hand, moving back over the bed to pick up one of the books, but he turns to shoot a tilted smirk over his shoulder. “Pretty cool, huh?”

It’s okay, in Jared’s opinion. No soda stream invention, but pretty cool, yeah. Even if Jensen is grinning at it like it’s the fucking Holy Grail.

“So you like to take photos?” Jared ventures, and then kind of kicks himself when Jensen’s smirk turn genuine and his gaze skips to the hanging mirror above the dresser, and the handful of pictures stuck into the frame there. Simple black and white shots that Jared completely overlooked when he breezed past them into the room. They stand out now, though, screaming out in the relief of the otherwise silent, dull room, now that Jared knows that Jensen is responsible for them. All of them. All with his own two hands and his little magic box.

“Yeah, I guess.” Jensen shrugs, trying for noncommittal, but his gaze lingers a little too long and a little too fondly on the frame be taken as such.

“Huh,” Jared says, his gaze lingering on the only one that actually depicts any kind of human life. The kid looks a couple of years older than Jensen, but the lines of his mouth as he laughs in the snapshot tie them together by blood somewhere along the line. Jared tries to remember if Jensen’s mentioned having a brother. But then, Jensen hasn’t mentioned a whole lot about his family. About anything, really – other than the fact that he’s failing algebra and could do with a tutor.

“Huh, what? What’s that supposed to mean?”

Another thing Jared’s rapidly realising about Jensen Ackles is that he’s kind of defensive. All the time.

“Huh nothing. I just didn’t expect all this.” Jared waves a hand at the snapshots. “You don’t seem like the fine arts type, is all.”

“It’s not fine art.” Before he can blink, Jensen’s skipped over behind him and is in the process of snatching the pictures off the mirror and laying them face down on the desk. He keeps the last one in his hand, though, and turns it over as he looks at it, shrugs a shoulder. “I just like it.”

Something Jensen Ackles should learn about Jared Padalecki is that he likes to prod. He prods a lot. Blame it on his Momma.

“Why? What’s so great about photography?”

Jared fully expects him to throw the picture on the pile and blow him off with some half-assed lie and a warning to mind his own fucking business. Instead, he just shrugs again and runs his thumb along the edge of the print.

“I like that it’s honest.” And there’s something so matter-of fact, something so purely sincere in his voice that Jared is instantly enraptured. “I like how it can capture someone in one second – one tiny spilt second – and show everything there is to know about them.”

He hands the photo off to Jared and Jared turns it over, watches the suspected Ackles brother laugh up at him. “You catch someone happy in a photo and they’re happy forever.”

Jared looks up from the picture with a smirk. “And what if you catch someone being sad?”

Jensen frowns at him and swipes the picture out of his hands, smacks it down on the desk. “You’re a real barrel of sunshine, Padalecki; anyone ever told you that?”

Jared grins despite himself. “So that’s what you want to be, huh? A photographer?”

Jensen looks up from where he’s just cracking open the schoolbooks and shoots him a self-deprecating smirk. “Let’s just work on getting me a real camera first. Huh?”

Jared doesn’t know why he can’t wipe the grin off his face after that.

Maybe because he just realised that there’s a whole bunch he doesn’t know about one Jensen Ackles.

 

8.

There’s a moment, in the dead of the night, when the whole world stops breathing.

The sky settles to the darkest of black, the birds are silent in the trees, and the wind dissolves into the crisp chill of morning against every window pane. It’s in these moments, Jared believes, that every single person in the whole world is exactly what they claim to be. No covers, no shields, no lies. Just perfect, silent, honest truth.

Jared’s spent most of these moments with Jensen.

He’s in that delicious lull between fully awake and fully unconscious when he hears it. An almost-silent tap of tree braches against the side of his wall – a flutter of leaves outside – the whoosh of nighttime air as the window rattles and slides against its frame. It sounds a lot like the past falling through his window, Jared thinks.

There’s silence after that as hesettles on the hardwood floor, still and quiet, letting eyes adjust to darkness and the exertion of scaling two storeys soften into steady breaths again. Jared doesn’t shift, doesn’t move, and doesn’t turn over. He knows the steps by heart anyway. They both do. Like a fucked up waltz. Round and round and round in the same old loop. Pretty to look at, maybe, but never going anywhere. Nowhere useful.

He keeps his eyes squeezed shut even where he feels the cool weight ease in beside him. Settle heavy and unmoving against the mattress. No hands, no lips, no premeditated intentions.

They used to do this all the time, back then. When the biggest Ackles was alive and well to prove himself a fucking nasty drunk. And when it got so bad it chased the littlest one out of the house and straight though Jared’s window once the world outside was quiet and everyone was sleeping, they’d do this – silent and still – the shadows of moonlight. Sometimes, Jared would turn over and run his fingers over the bruises or cracked lips, try and log each one to memory, try to will away the sting with the power of his fingertips.

He’d leave before the sun rises tomorrow, and no one will never know and Jared is usually left wondering if he dreamt the whole damn thing. Until Jensen shows up later, bruises faded green and a jumpy, sheepish look on his face.

“Are you awake?” It’s whispered into the dark confines of the room, pointlessly, because he knows the answer. Knows that Jared was never asleep. Knows that somehow, somewhere along the line, Jared’s become acutely sensitised to the sound of branches against double glazing. Probably knows just how much Jared resents having to add it to the list of useless skills he’s picked up concerning Jensen.

“I’m sorry,” he whispers, and Jared squeezes his eyes shut harder. Tries to lock in the urge to scream, Sorry for what? Because he knows he’d answer. Everything, honestly, no lies – no shields.

He blinks his eyes open instead, takes in the red digits burning through the dark. 3.16. It’s that time, after all. The time for truth. It’s no one else’s fault that Jared doesn’t want to hear it.

Because the real truth is, Jensen’s dad is long gone now. He isn’t there to chase Jensen out of the house. Now, Jensen causes his own injuries.

“I’m just sorry.”

Jared thinks that’s maybe even sadder than before.

 

9.

“So, Jared.”

Jared looks away from the TV he’s been staring blankly at for the last half hour to where his mother is leaning against the door jamb, arms casually folded, head tilted. He might not have been home in a while, but he remembers what that look means. Every son on the planet has that look ingrained in his mind.

“Hmm?” he hums anyway.

“Not that I’m not thrilled to have you here, but…how long are you planning on being here, exactly?”

Jared looks away from the TV to smirk wryly. “Is the welcome mat wearing thin already?”  
His mother rolls her eyes, pushing off the door frame and coming over to slide onto the coffee table in front of him. “Of course not,” she scoffs, nudging his knees with hers and then tipping her head. “It’s just a little disconcerting, that’s all; you being back here, so suddenly. After all these months… I mean, the funeral was days ago, honey; isn’t your boss worried?” Jared mutes the TV, throws the remote to the cushion beside him to stare at her with his full attention.

Sherry levels him with a look. “Baby, you know you can stay here for as long as you want – no details needed, you know that. Just…” She sighs and reaches out to touch his knee gently, imploringly. “I just worry about you, that’s all.”

He had been in New York for almost twelve months. The city with probably one of most severe crime rates in the country, living alone, and he’d never known her flutter an eyelid. Now he’s home. And she worries. Of course she does. He watches her for a second more and then takes a breath, lowers his gaze to where his fingers are idly picking at a loose thread on the upholstery. “I had to come home,” he says eventually, looking up to see his mother’s eyes soften suddenly; her lips tilt up in a tiny, private smile.

“Jared, please, honey. Give me some credit – I know why you’re home. Hell, the mailman knows why you’re home. I’m just reminding you that you have a life now. Away from here, all by yourself, and it’s a pretty good one. Just be careful, is all I’m saying.” Her eyebrow twitches knowingly. “And I’m not talking about condoms this time.”

Jared rolls his eyes with a groan, tipping his head back to rest it tiredly against the top of the sofa as his mother laughs, reaches out to slap his knee.

“But I was actually talking more about here here.” She raises an eyebrow and gestures her eyes towards the pile of art pads at her thigh, the crumpled blankets pushed to the edge of the sofa, the dirty plate on the floor. “You haven’t left my couch in two days. I need to vacuum, eventually.”

Jared dips his gaze from the ceiling to look at her pointedly. “Are you implying I’m a slob?”

“I’m implying you need to get the fuck off my couch and go do something productive.”

Jared could count on his fingers the amount of times he’s heard his mother curse – so he sighs heavily and shifts his legs to move up.

“And Jared?” He pauses to glance back down at his mother sitting pretty smugly in his wrinkled nest of blankets. “By ‘something productive,’ I don’t mean anything with the initials J.R.A.”

He narrows his eyes. “I hope you know I don’t appreciate this colour on you.”

 

10.

Jared’s a dog person, always has been. Cats freak him out, goldfish bore him stupid – he’s had an intense fear of goats since one grabbed his mitten through the fence at a farm when he was four and nearly amputated his left thumb. He feels safer with dogs. Dogs are his favourite.

But he’s growing mighty fond of elephants nowadays, too.

“You here for dinner tonight, sweetie?” his mother asks, but what she’s really saying is “My casserole is better for you than that other thing you’re planning on doing tonight.”

His baby sister asks, “Are you coming to my game on Saturday?” But what she really means is, “Are you gonna make it better now?”

Chad calls him on Sunday morning and tells him he’s got cold beers and a Spurs game on the TV, but what Jared hears is “You’re a fucking idiot, Padalecki.”

Saturdays dawn slower in Texas than anywhere else in the world; always have, in Jared’s opinion. There’s a hazy strip of light falling through the lonely box window and directly across the wood floor to the foot of the mattress. The sheets have been washed twice now, since Jared’s been here. He knows, because he keeps leaving tiny little traces of ballpoint pen or coffee stains on their corners so he can secretly monitor their progress through the spin cycle. It’s pathetic, really. No rhyme or reason behind it at all. Except that two times through the cycle means he cares twice as much as he did before.

That’s something, in Jared’s opinion.

“What are you doing today?” he asks, and it’s scratchy and distant as he traces a path up Jared’s bare side with the tip of his finger.

Jared tilts his face down to look at him not looking back. “Meg’s volleyballs game is today,” he tells him and the finger pauses, only slightly, and then continues its track. “They’re up by five. She thinks they’ll bag a shot at the championship.”

Jensen hums, low and quiet, “They need to strengthen their defence on the right side,” he says, and it sounds like an afterthought. “Erin’s losing her game and Ronnie hasn’t touched the ball since last season.”

It startles a short laugh out of Jared, and Jensen’s grinning when he pushes up and over him. Leans down to brush his lips against Jared’s. And Jared envies the easiness of it.

Jared can’t trace Jensen’s skin whenever he wants. He’s long stopped trying to place the nicks and scars that he’ll find there – half afraid he’ll get lost now in the lines and colours marring his arms. Jared was always useless at reading maps.

And of course asking what Jensen was doing today could be construed as prying. Or nosing, or not trusting. And Jared doesn’t really have the heart to start a fight on a Saturday.

“You know, you could come,” Jared ventures, and the startled look Jensen shoots him almost has him believing they’ll be fighting today regardless. “Tell Erin to pull her finger outta her ass yourself.”

They both pause on an exhale, the lazy Saturday morning air crackling around them. And then Jensen is rolling off and away. Padding barefoot and stark naked into the tiny hole of a bathroom and not bothering to click the door shut. “I have stuff to do today.”

And Jared stares at the open door until he hears the shower turn on. Grips the hair back off his face and pulls it tight in his fingers to feel the tug and burn against his scalp. “I know what you’re doing today,” he wants to say – but there’s no point. It won’t change anything. It’s long past the point of Jared’s knowing making any difference at all.

He gives the pink elephant standing in the kitchen a subtle nod on his way out the door.

 

11.

It’s as if everyone in Jared’s life shares his motto for not fighting on Saturday, because they’ve apparently bottled all their resentment up for Sunday morning. Fucking figures. Jared always suspected God was a bloodthirsty son of a bitch.

He fights with his mom about going back to New York.

“The publishing house called with your references!” He’s set foot in the house for all of thirty seconds and his mother is practically steamrolling over him, waving a piece of paper in his face. She throws the paper at his stunned chest and it flutters pathetically the floor of the hallway. “And wished you well in your future endeavours!” Her hair is sticking up all over the place, like she’s been sitting running her hands through it for the better part of the day, and her eyes look a lot like that time when three-year-old Megan redecorated the den with her make-up case.

“I can write anywhere,” he argues to deaf ears. “The internship is up. It was never the plan to stay in New York!”

“And what exactly is the plan, Jared?” she screams back, and Jared catches Megan lingering uneasily on the staircase, eyes wide, fingers white on the banister, and Jared wishes he had an answer for both of them. He thinks he used to have one, a plan. He’s pretty sure it would have gone off without a hitch as well, if he hadn’t fucked up and met Jensen Ackles freshman year and proceeded to fall too far into something he knew far too little about.

Plans change. Jared knows this. He used to believe the same about people.

“Fine,” his mother says, finally, after it becomes pretty clear that they’re getting nowhere fast.

Jared loves his mother more than anyone on the world. He thinks she’s probably one of the strongest, wisest, smartest people he knows – and his whole life, he’s listened to everything she’s ever taught him. Taken her advice on every aspect of everything.

Everything except one.

“Fine, Jared. You stay! Stay here and throw your life down the crapper. Stay for the weather, or for the colleges, or for your sister, but for fuck’s sake, don’t stay for him.” She meets his eyes and he sees all of those things that he loves in her – wisdom and strength and truth. “Because he’ll ruin your life. You mark my words.”

It shouldn’t be so easy to ignore them all.

He fights with Chad about geography.

“You’re the one who said I should come back!” Jared screams, basketball game forgotten and droning as a backdrop to their now ruined afternoon. “You’re the one who blasted me every two weeks for not coming home more!”

“Yeah for a fucking weekend, maybe! Thanksgiving. I never told you to crawl back here and throw your fucking job away!”

“So you wish I’d stayed in the city, is that what you’re saying?”

“I’m saying I would rather you be 5000 miles away and never see any of us again than stay here and be dragged under by him.”

“He’s your friend too, Chad.”

And Chad looks tired – for probably the first time in the whole time Jared’s known him.

“Jensen was my friend.” He shakes his head slowly and meets Jared’s eyes dead on. “He’s in too deep to even remember who that person was anymore. And you’re too fucking blind to see it.”

Jared doesn’t correct him. Mainly, he thinks, because the actuality of it is just too fucking pathetic. Jared isn’t blind. He’s just a dab hand at closing his eyes.

He goes to see Josh because he figures he’s a safe bet; he’s too far gone before he realises his mistake. Joshua is an Ackles, however he’s wrapped nowadays. And there’s no such thing a safe bet when Jared’s dealing with one of those.

“I appreciate your persistence, kiddo, but I’m not giving him his job back.”

Jared sighs heavily and leans back against one of the work stations. Josh is flat out on his back under a 1967 Chevy so he can’t see Jared throw his hands out in aggravation.

“Why not?”

“Because I fired his ass. And I’ve already got a replacement starting Monday.”

“He’s your brother.”

“My brother brought his skeezy fucking dealers into our workplace – into our house! I have a wife in there, Jared – a fucking kid on the way here; I can’t be putting up with that shit anymore.”

“You can’t just…”

“Don’t fucking tell me what I can and can’t do. You haven’t been here, alright – you can’t just fucking walk back in here and think you know. You don’t!”

“I know you’re full of shit if you think you don’t give a crap about him.”

The trolley slides out from under the engine and familiarly green eyes pin him – oil smudged over one cheek, and he looks like Jensen then, Jared thinks. And it just makes it worse.

“I give a crap,” he says, and Jared knows. He knows the difference, knows all of the limits that go along with caring about someone too much to watch them hurt themselves.

Jared’s just never been able to grasp them for any stretch of time when it comes to him. He wonders if Josh can teach him.

“You love him too. I get it, kid. I get it.” The trolley slides back and Jared knows it’s just so the broken face that matches the broken voice is hidden from his view. “But you’re a fucking fool of you stick around. He’s not gonna stop for you. He’s not gonna stop for anything.”

Come Sunday night, Jared’s exhausted and angry and restless and the one person who he actually should have been screaming at all day isn’t even fucking here. Because it’s all Jensen’s fault, really – even if Jared never says it. Even if he knows, deep down, that it’s not – not really. It’s just one of those fucked up situations that can’t really place blame, just spin it round and round until it becomes moot and empty.

Jared loves Jensen, but not enough to stick around. Jensen loves Jared, but not enough to cut him loose. It’s the endless cycle they’ve been caught in since they were sixteen and Jared doesn’t see it changing any time soon.

And for the hundredth time in Jared’s life, Jared hates Jensen Ackles for ever laying eyes on him.

 

12.

Jared’s been back in town for almost a week before Chris puts in an appearance. Jared’s mother lets him in and glares at Jared with dubious eyes on her way back to the kitchen because she’s still sore about the New York issue and Chris is probably the closest thing to Jensen that she can grab hold of and spit on for the time being.

“You know, you don’t write, you don’t call…” Kane drones, leaning easily against the door jamb with folded arms and a tweaked brow. “A guy could get a complex.”

“You called me, Chris,” Jared replies dryly, his eyes never leaving his laptop screen. “You called me and told me he was in trouble so I’m back. What did you expect?”

“Well, I expected no less, Wonder Boy.”

The computer lid is slammed down with a crack and Jared spins in his chair to face him. Just like that, his patience snaps. Almost a whole week of walking on eggshells, holding his tongue, pissing his mother off, and Jared’s about done. And Chris, well, Chris is a good a target as any.

“What the fuck happened, Chris?” He was aiming for it to come out angry, but it just sounds tired and Jared hates it. “He was off before I left, right? Okay, I get it – but it was gonna be a wake-up call, right? I mean, that’s what you told me – wasn’t it? What we agreed on? All these fucking useless promises and half-assed lies and tiptoeing around it wasn’t doing any good.” He’s shrill now, he knows – his mother’s probably got her face plastered up against the kitchen door and Megan is most likely dangling over the banister, but Chris barely blinks. Sure as hell doesn’t reply. Just twitches a bushy eyebrow and watches Jared go on. “Wake up call – isn’t that what you said. What you all fucking said? Leave, Jared, ain’t no use makin’ empty threats. He needs a wake up call. So guess what, Chris, I left. And now what, huh? What the fuck happened now?”

Kane shrugs a flannel shoulder and his mouth twists into something like a smirk. “Guess he hit the snooze, son – what can I say.”

A startled, disbelieving laugh tumbles out of Jared, high and shrill before he can stop it. “Right – yeah, of course. Silly me.”

“Look, boy, I don’t know what you want me to tell you.” The flannel arms are uncrossed and Chris takes a step into the room. “You know him, more than me, more than Josh – more than anyone. You know that he tried. And he did, Jared. He was doing alright.”

Jared focuses on taking steady breaths as he deflates and tries not to punch Chris in the face. “And?”

Flannel twitches again. “And it don’t take no Freudian to figure it out, kid.” Jared lifts his eyes and stares right at him; Chris holds his gaze. “His daddy came back.”

And that, right there, is the piece of the puzzle that Jared thought he’d been missing. Kind of like those jigsaws his grandma used to rope him into on Sunday afternoons, when he would finally find that final missing square and realise that he’d been staring at it in some shape or form for the entire time.

Alan fucking Ackles. Jared has always hated him. With a passion, with a fucking vengeance, and for a second, Jared feels a little bit ashamed of himself for hating a dead guy.

But then, Alan is probably the only dead guy he knows who can fuck up his kids’ lives without even breathing.

 

13.

He’s walking sluggishly when he finally comes through the door. Throws his keys to one side with a clatter and sniffs harshly before he looks up and pins Jared, leaning all casual like against his kitchen counter.

It hadn’t been hard to break in. The door hadn’t been locked.

“Why didn’t you tell me he came back here?”

Bloodshot eyes blink and then he’s dragging his feet over to the fridge, tugging it open and sifting through the insides. He doesn’t want anything, Jared knows. Only to look busier with life than he is.

“‘Cause it was none of your fucking business.”

“Bullshit.” Jared’s got the fridge door smacked shut before he registers he’s moving, unchecked rage suddenly surging through him, making his hands vibrate. He doesn’t know why – doesn’t know why he’s still fucking surprised by this shit. Jensen sidestepping the truth and everyone else falling in line around him to accommodate his fucking sensibilities. That’s half the problem, Jared’s pretty sure. “Bullshit, Jensen.” Jared tilts his chin and watches Jensen look anywhere else. “What did he want?”

Jared half knows already – some from what he pieced together from Chris, some from what he suspected all along. But then, that’s half of the problem at hand, he guesses. Jensen sidesteps the truth, everyone else falls in around him, and Jared stands there and pleads the fifth.

Pretends he doesn’t know where Jensen’s been for the last nine hours. Pretends right along with him when he comes back and says nothing at all.

Close your eyes tight enough and the world disappears. But it’s always right there waiting when you open them again. Jared thinks maybe they’re a little late in realising that last fact.

“He wanted to kiss and make up, of course.”

He wanted more than that, according to Chris. A clean slate, a new beginning. He wanted back in. And Josh may have been willing to bend on the basis of fatherhood, both fresh and newfound, but his little brother hadn’t been so sympathetic.

“Let me guess,” Jared spits out harshly, and there’s only hollow humour licking his tone. “He changed?”

Because Jensen wouldn’t have believed a word of it – not one fucking syllable. Josh might have inherited their daddy’s jaw and his mean right hook, but all he ever gave Jensen were smoke screens. The apple and the tree – Jared thinks its fucking ironic.

Jensen shrugs harshly and shoulders Jared out of the way as he passes, but Jared grabs his wrist and tugs on his retreat.

“Jensen. It wasn’t your fault.”

The wrist is snatched back, but he doesn’t move away. Doesn’t turn around. “I know.”

“Do you?” Because there’s a handful of track marks and a pretty bad attitude that says otherwise, but Jared knows it’s better not to point that out. It’s pretty apparent all round at this point.

“Yes, Jared.” He sounds tired, like he’s had the conversation a hundred times before even though Jared knows he hasn’t discussed it at all. And he doesn’t want to now, but tough shit. Jared’s had enough of tiptoeing around elephants and playing pretend like fucking four-year-olds.

“He was over the limit. He got into a car and he ran a stoplight.” Jared’s voice is low and steady, because he needs him to understand this. If nothing else – if he can’t fix anything else, Jared needs him to know this one thing. “It was an accident. It was his fault, Jensen. You didn’t do anything wrong. But you still should have told me.”

The whole time Jared had been talking, Jensen looked like he was in physical pain, his previously blank face twisting and trying to even itself out at the same time, but at that, it changes. Alive and sharp and suddenly furious.

“Tell you when, Jared? When exactly where you here to tell? Because the last time I checked, you were halfway across the fucking country!”

“You’d rather I stay here and watch you fucking kill yourself?”

“You fucking abandoned me!” he screams. And that’s the truth. As plain and as clear as Jensen sees it post buzz, post grieving. Even if it’s all lies. Jared abandoned nothing. Nothing but his common fucking sense in coming back.

The sound of the door rattling on his hinges vibrates throughout the entire shoddy apartment and Jared is left with the sickening feeling he’s just made something bad even worse.

The sun has dipped dangerously close to the horizon before Jared allows himself to worry. His fingers hit Josh’s buttons first – tries to act nonchalant when he tells Jared he hasn’t seen him at all – asks if everything’s alright. “Everything’s fine,” Jared lies, because Ackleses aren’t the only ones who can master the smoke screen. Jared’s picked up more than a few tricks over the years. Bad habits pass through osmosis around these parts.

He does five laps around the apartment and then tries the same on Chris with a less stellar effect. He’s made to promise he’ll call with updates before morning on a threat of death and goes back to pacing.

He’s on lap fourteen when his twitchy fingers brush against the box on the one shelf cluttering the dusty wall. It’s above the box spring, tucked behind a pile of junk mail and a blinking alarm clock that hadn’t been reset after the last time the electricity tripped. It’s one of the only miscellaneous items in the whole place, and Jared hadn’t really paid it much mind before. Tried to stop his eyes from roaming the bare walls and dismal confines after the first time he came here.

His hands are pulling out its insides before he can truly decide if he wants to know. Feels like someone’s insides should be spilled open and examined tonight.

Before he knows it, he’s got handfuls of old photographs – black and white, Polaroid, shiny, shiny digital. Some of them recent, colour and sunshine and smiles. Others from way back – offset by a blur of a pin hole shot – most implacable to Jared himself. But one spills from the pack and flutters to the floor. From one dirty panel near his foot, a familiar monochrome snapshot blurs up at him.

He’s got the ratty picture of a laughing Josh in his fingers as he dials Chad with the other hand. His friend answers on the third ring, snappy but present. Like always. No matter how many times they yell and call each other’s bullshit. Jared doesn’t bother with pleasantries.

“I need to borrow your car.”

 

14.

The hallway probably isn’t as dark as it seems. The bare walls are patchy with damp and mould – peeling plaster and old paper clinging precariously to the sides afraid to touch the dirty, threadbare carpet that looks like it has more than a hideous paisley print living on it. He walks over it in short, steady steps, picking his way between used condoms and cracked needles; hands and feet that have spilt out into the hallway to create an obscene obstacle course. His eyes are still adjusting to the dim light and foggy haze that seems to clog the air, smoke and dust mingling together to sting his eyes and blur his already hazy vision. Every step, another scent assaults him – sickly, sweet, putrid smells, like a kid threw up two hundred pounds of candy and then died in it.

Doors litter the sides between slumped bodies and soiled bowls, like some sort of fucked up game show, and he stops at every one – presses the side of his face against the wood and holds his breath to listen – tries the handle to see if it gives. See what prize lies behind.

He hears footfalls behind him, above the muted grunts and groans and the faint din of crying that buzzes in the air like white noise; a steady backdrop. He doesn’t need to look back to see who the feet belong to; he knows who it is. He knows that for all the bravado, for all his harsh words and cruel truths, Chad wouldn’t have lasted two minutes scowling against the truck outside before following him in.

“You’re making a mistake,” Chad had told him only minutes before, imploring him to see sense, to see reason. It’s all much of the same though – the same thing he’s been told by his mother, by Josh, by Chris, by Jensen himself.

You’re making a mistake.

But it’s his to make. And it’s his to fix. Jared knows that now.

Just like he knows that the door in front of him is the winner without even pressing his face against it; knows with the kind of instinct that let him know this was the right neighbourhood, the right building, the right floor – even when everything else was so wrong.

Wrong, wrong, wrong.

Jared lets himself hesitate for a split second, one hand flat against the cold wood, the other wrapped around the handle, before pushing it ajar – waits until he hears the footfalls stall behind him before he slips inside. He blinks against the darker shade of the new room, lets the new smells and the new sounds settle against his senses before his eyes trip over the various angles spread out around him. Even in the dark, he can find the pile of familiar ones in the far corner, slouched and distorted against the bathtub.

Only one person in this room. Only one prize. But it’s the one he’s been looking for.

Jensen.

He doesn’t twitch as he eases himself down beside him, onto the cold, dirty linoleum that smells like disease and sits still, lets him breathe in, regroup; remember how to do this.

The rags twitch once when Jared pokes at them, twice when he nudges them hard with his knee. One eye blinks open, squints against the outside world, and it’s like someone’s poked a pin hole in a blackout blind. Emerald green shines outwards, doped and bright and ridiculously glassy, and pins him.

“Jay?”

Jared clears his throat, pretends he can only smell Mentos and cherry cola on the breathy exhale – pretends he hasn’t ever promised he’d never force himself to pretend like this again.

Jared has never broken a promise. Never. Especially not the ones that mattered.

But then, Jared thinks, he’s broken a lot of things when it comes to this man in front of him. Promises, plans, hearts, laws. For some reason, all the morals and common sense logic that Jared carries on his shoulders don’t apply here – to them, to him. And for the first time in this whole mess, Jared’s strangely okay with that.

“Yeah, Jen, it’s me. I’ve come to take you home.”

It is what it is. And Jared has a promise to keep to his baby sister that he plans on upholding. So he squeezes his eyes closed and powers though – forges on. Because they’re going nowhere if they’re not moving forward. Even if it is in fucking loops and circles – half blind and misinformed.

“We’re going home.”

 

 

 

It takes seventeen minutes to get to St. Vincent’s from Jared’s house with no traffic and running two questionable stop lights.

Jared knows this for certain. Has for a while. Knows it from every frantic, erratic phone call that’s been filtered through his cell since he was seventeen years old: “Jared, you gotta come…” “Jay, it’s Chris, man, it’s bad…” “Mr. Padalecki, this is St. Vincent’s medical; we have a Jensen Ackles here…”

He forgets, sometimes, that these places are used for good as well.

“It’s a boy.” Genevieve is giddy, practically vibrating in her pink bunny rabbit scrubs, and Jared feels people shoot to their feet all around him. All except Jensen, sitting prone beside him. Fingers tighten over his and Gen looks directly at them.

“He’s asking to see you.”

Jensen swallows, seems unsteady on his feet when he gets up, and their interlocking fingers mean Jared has little choice but to follow.

The baby is tiny and whiny and smells like talc and hope. It squirms when Josh passes it off into the folds of Jensen’s arms, completely ignoring the tear tracks on his cheeks or the way Jensen goes perfectly still once the precious weight is transferred from body to body. Jared steps up to them and reaches out to run a hand over soft, fine baby hair and the baby stops – no noise, no squirms – and blinks clear green eyes up at Jensen’s face.

The truth is, when Jared Padalecki was a little boy, he knew exactly what he wanted to be when he grew up. He used to stand in the rain and believe that he’d be tall and brave and brilliant. He’d breathe in deep, from that place at the bottom of his yard, and know in the bottom of his soul that one day, he’d be loved and rich and fearless. Because in that yard, after that rainstorm, caught in that breath of fresh air that marked a new moment – Jared believed anything he wanted.

Right now, Jared believes he could be anywhere, anywhere at all, so long as Jensen was standing right beside him – healthy and laughing and completely imperfect.

Jensen. The boy who never knew exactly what he wanted to be – other than nothing like his father, and everything society despised.

The wiggling lump blinks up from Jensen’s arms and then lets out a tiny hiccup that might be gas, might be utter contentment.

“I think he likes me.” Jensen laughs on a breathy exhale, blinking up familiar green eyes at Jared in something like awe.

Jared knows that it doesn’t matter what this kid grows up to be. He’ll be loved and wise and brilliant. He’ll be fearless in ways that Jared has never learned to be.

Jared knows that with everything he is; this kid will know that his uncle Jensen is the bravest person he’d ever want to meet.

“I think you’re right,” Jared concedes, pressing his lips against Jensen’s temple as they stare down at the baby.

He’s leaning against the building’s exterior under the canopy that shades the swoosh of automatic doors and the parking lot. Rain runs in torrents off its ledge, in the distance; Jared can hear the rumble of distant thunder and counts miles in his head as his father’s voice rings loud and clear.

“Just God bowling, son. Nothing to worry about”.

Turns out, there’s more to worry about than his dad would have him believe back then. Not thunder, though. Jared has always loved a good rainstorm.

“You’re gonna get pneumonia.”

Jared tilts his head to the side to watch Jensen sidle up beside him, his gaze following Jared’s eye line out to the rain-soaked parking lot, mostly empty at this hour.

“Well aren’t you a barrel of sunshine, Ackles.”

Jensen smirks and pulls a pack of cigarettes out of his jean pocket, tapping them against his thigh as he shoots Jared a subtle sideways glance. “Josh is giving me the guilt trip about the cigs.”

Jared thinks Josh should maybe learn to count his victories – but he keeps that to himself. Jared would happily keep count for him, if Josh wanted to take the reins on the defeats.

“Well, I do hear they can kill ya.”

“That’s generally his leading argument, yeah,” Jensen mumbles around the end of one, flicking his lighter open against his thigh. “And that whole ‘Logan needs his uncle’ shtick.”

Jared smiles to himself, tilts his head again after a second and watches him under the harsh florescent light of the entrance. “Hey.” He waits until he has Jensen’s attention before he lets his lips twitch in the threat of a real smile. “I love you.”

And there it is, the honest truth. The only truth. The only thing that matters in all of this. And Jared doesn’t know if it’s the rain, or the setting, or the time of night – but he’s more than willing to believe Jensen completely when he grins suddenly and reaches forward with the hand that’s not cradling the light to pull Jared’s face to his and whisper against his lips.

“I love you, too.”

And while the rain continues to cover the concrete outside, Jared breathes in deep, his eyes completely open. And he lets himself believe, just for one second, that everything is perfectly, absolutely okay.

And they turn around. And they go back inside.


End file.
